A long time ago...

A sometimes overlooked, but great generation:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Lloyd Brown remembers Armistice Day in 1918 as few -- ever so few -- veterans can.

"For the servicemen there were lots of hugs and kisses," recalls Brown, of Charlotte Hall, Maryland, a teenage seaman aboard the battleship USS New Hampshire, in port stateside when the fighting stopped. "We were so happy that the war was over."

Now 104, Brown adds, "There's not too many of us around any more."

No one knows exactly how many of America's World War I veterans will celebrate Veterans Day, which marks the armistice of November 11, 1918, that ended what then was considered the Great War. An estimated 2 million Americans served in Europe after the U.S. entered the war in 1917.

Today, the Veterans Affairs Department lists just eight veterans as receiving disability benefits or pension compensation from service in World War I. It says a few dozen other veterans of the war probably are alive, too, but the government does not keep a comprehensive list.